how do I set up a secure page on my website?
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how do I set up a secure page on my website?
06-08-2012 5:33 PM
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Best regards, Mick
Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
06-08-2012 5:40 PM
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http://www.freewebmasterhelp.com/tutorials/htaccess/
Ex-Broadband Service Manager
Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
06-08-2012 7:19 PM
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Quote from: jelv ... just put the pages you want to be protected in to a sub-directory which you would password protect.
and ...
Quote from: spraxyt (The procedure for password protecting that folder) is described in the Community Support Library article How to password protect your website. The files you need to upload will become "hidden" when they are renamed so their first character is a dot. To make FileZilla show these you need to go to its Server menu and select (tick) the bottom item that says "Force showing hidden files". You can leave that permanently selected.
Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
06-08-2012 11:49 PM
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Connect to your webspace and go to the folder you want to password protect, and upload both files.
Use your FTP program to CHMOD htaccess.txt to 744 (File Owner: read, write & execute, group & public: read only).
I'm using Filezilla so where do I find the CHMOD etc. & what is (File Owner: etc).
I've been onto Filezilla & used server/force showing hidden files & then uploaded the two files but I'm a little confused. What do I do next?
Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
07-08-2012 11:03 AM
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However the default value for uploaded files will be 644 and that should work OK, even though the article says 744 is needed. I suggest leaving the file permissions unchanged at 644. If you've uploaded the file you want to restrict to the new folder browse to it and you should be asked to provide the username and password you set for that directory. The URL you need will be like http://... website .../newfolder/newfile.htm.
Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
07-08-2012 9:15 PM
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Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
08-08-2012 12:05 AM
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On the support page it reads: Step 4, The final step is to rename the two files as follows - note the leading full stop:
•Rename htaccess.txt to .htaccess
•Rename htpasswd.txt to .htpasswd
Should I have renamed them on both the local site as well as the remote site, if only one, which one? Should I have dropped the .txt extention?
Why on Filezilla is the file size different on the local site to that on the remote site even after a transfer has been successful?
Many thanks thanks for your help, I'm trying to learn as fast as I can.
Best regards, Mick
Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
08-08-2012 2:06 PM
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When you want to upload files to a particular folder, in my opinion the easiest approach is to click (once) on that folder name in FileZilla's top right-hand (remote site) pane; that should open the folder so its contents (if any) show in the bottom right-hand pane. The "remote site" box will say /htdocs/newfolder.
If you now drag files from the left-hand pane (your own computer) to the right-hand one (remote site) they will be uploaded into the required location - newfolder.
It is possible to move files between folders when renaming them but for now I think the simplest solution is to delete the file uploaded to your web root /htdocs, and upload it again into newfolder.
The control files htaccess.txt and htpasswd.txt need to retain those names on your own computer - Windows does not handle filenames that start with a dot well. They should be renamed to .htaccess and .htpasswd (add the dot and remove the ,txt extensions) only on the web site after being uploaded.
The filesizes on the website differ from those on your computer because when uploading recognised text files FileZilla changes their line endings from Windows format CRLF (two characters, carriage return - line feed) to Linux format LF (just line feed). So the remote file should be smaller by 1 byte for each line, except possibly for the last line which might not have a line ending. The reverse happens when files are downloaded.
I assume newfile.htm is not really called index.htm and you don't have an index.htm in newfolder. Have you checked what you get if you browse to http:// ... website ... /newfolder without specifying a file name?

Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
10-08-2012 10:45 PM
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Question 2: I only want to protect a page within my website & if I save both the access & passwd files to the folder that the page is in, I then can't access the site, a network 500 error appears. I've created a newfolder & saved both of the access/passwd files plus the members page, but when I try to find them on my browser I only get the 404 failure message.
I really hate to beat beaten & as 'your student', I'd love to say that I've got it up & running. I've now deleted my members page as I'd really like to start again. Can you lay the whole procedure as talking to an idiot, I can follow basic instruction, just don't go too deep. I wish you lived in Kent!
Best regards, Mick
Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
11-08-2012 12:23 AM
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Who is hosting your website? Does the provider you are using support PHP?
If it does support PHP, I've some ideas about how you can implement this pretty easily

Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
11-08-2012 1:55 PM
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Getting a server 500 error suggests there is something in the .htaccess file that the Apache server does not like. What editor are you using to create the original htaccess.txt file? If you are using Frontpage to create that (and the accompanying htpasswd.txt) there is potential for big trouble.
Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
13-08-2012 8:56 PM
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Chris, if you think that you know of a way to implement this I'll give it a shot. Spraxyt, I'd obviously like your comments on the advice given. Come on guys, you're the experts, I'm only the apprentice.
Best regards, Mick.
Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
15-08-2012 2:09 AM
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Firstly, please create a folder on your website literally called newdir (I assume that name doesn't clash with anything there already).
You can do that in FileZilla by FTPing to your website, ( / will show as Remote site ),
click the + just below Remote site
right click the htdocs icon and select Create directory
type newdir in place of the highlighted New directory and click OK.
Now click the + against htdocs, and click newdir to display its contents in the lower pane (Empty directory listing at the moment)
Then create the file helloworld.htm in Notepad on your own computer containing
[code=helloworld.htm]
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1">
<title>Simple Hello World Page</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>Hello World!</h1>
</body>
</html>[/code]
Save the file as helloworld.htm and use FileZilla to upload it into folder newdir on your websie. I am expecting the file size of helloworld.htm to be 195 bytes on your own computer, and 187 bytes on your website. If your sizes are different the values should differ by 8.
If you now browse to http:// ... website ... /newdir/helloworld.htm does Hello World! display?
Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
15-08-2012 10:32 PM
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Best regards.
Re: how do I set up a secure page on my website?
16-08-2012 8:47 PM
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Hello World! is displayed. Now I'm excited.
question: why in FileZilla is there a question mark symbol in the htdocs folder below the main folder? (just an observation)
best regards, Mick.
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